Robert Sebree/ FoxAnthony Anderson and Cole Hauser played cops facing the challenges of enforcing the law in post-Katrina New Orleans in Fox's "K-Ville."

The 2007 Fox network drama "K-Ville" is unavoidable context when the subject of "Treme" comes up.

A cop show set in post-Katrina New Orleans, "K-Ville" was TV's first attempt at capturing the world made by failed-levee flooding. Never a national ratings success, the show came and went in fewer than a dozen episodes, but not before sparking a fierce local debate over its intentions and execution.

"Treme," a prospective new series for HBO set in the city's music community, will start its story a few weeks after the storm. The show's pilot shot in town in March and April. Word of a first-season pickup (or not) from the network is expected in the next few weeks.

Co-created by David Simon (creator of "The Wire" and a longtime New Orleans habitue) and Eric Overmyer (a writing staff veteran of "St. Elsewhere," "Homicide: Life on the Street" and "The Wire," as well as a New Orleans homeowner for many years), "Treme" promises to be everything that "K-Ville" couldn't be.

Overmyer knows better than most that the task for "K-Ville's" creators was near-impossible. In an e mail, reprinted here with Overmyer's permission, he provides locals holding out hope for "Treme" some valuable insight into the process that (maybe) gave New Orleans its first-ever gumbo party, as well as the production differences between the two shows that should help "Treme" avoid "K-Ville" clunkers.

As it happens, Cobb and Boulet's greatest hits and misses have recently become reviewable again, thanks to the online TV site www.Hulu.com. All of the "K-Ville" episodes that aired in fall 2007 are there for free online streaming (but with commercials).

I've queried Fox about the Hulu prospects for the one unaired "K-Ville" episode, titled "Game Night," and if the Hulu release nixes an eventual DVD box set of the series. No word on either yet.

Here's part one of the letter, which Overmyer titled, "A Kind Word for the 'K' Word":

"Dave Walker at the Times-Picayune has mentioned the late, mostly unlamented Fox series 'K-Ville' a couple of times in his online and in print coverage of 'Treme,' the pilot and potential series David Simon and I and our colleagues are now preparing for HBO. [Moderator, author and former Times-Picayune city editor] Ned Horne said the K-word, by way of comparison (favorable, it goes without saying, to our efforts), when he introduced me and David at the Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival. The 'Gambit' cover story on 'Treme' a few weeks ago called 'K-Ville' 'an unintentional comedy.'

"Most (although not all) of the comments about 'K-Ville' I heard while we were in New Orleans shooting the pilot last month were in a similar vein. While I was flattered and moved by the local perception that we were somehow 'getting it right,' and certainly we were all inspired from the beginning to do just that, I felt a twinge whenever the K-word was invoked, almost universally, as a low bar we were not only obligated but sure to get over.

"I was certainly aware of the overarching local reaction to the show when it aired. The phrase 'gumbo party,' for instance, provoked a flood of derisive commentary amongst the local blogaratti (although someone told me recently they'd come across the very phrase in a piece of 19th century writing on the city - Lafcadio Hearn? - a citation which I have yet to verify, but if true means a lot of people will be eating a big bowl of gumbo creaux.)

"At the risk of being tarred and feathered and mocked mercilessly online, let me say a few words in defense of 'K-Ville' and its creators. I know Jonathan Lisco, the writer and executive producer of 'K-Ville,' and his producing director, Kevin Dowling. I consider them friends, colleagues, and all-round talented, good guys with nothing but love in their hearts for New Orleans, and the best of intentions. It should go without saying that they set out to make the very best series they could - and do something that would play well nationally and locally, and stay on the air.

"So, if we stipulate for the sake of argument that the show could have been better, at least in terms of its depiction of the Crescent City and its traditions and curious customs, how did it fall short of expectations (theirs more than anyone's, I venture to say)?

• What: "Treme," a prospective HBO drama set in the New Orleans music community.

•Who: Co-created by David Simon ("The Wire") and Eric Overmyer ("St. Elsewhere," "The Wire"), the series, if picked up to go a full season by the network, would star New Orleans native Wendell Pierce ("The Wire"), Clarke Peters ("The Wire"), Khandi Alexander ("The Corner"), Steve Zahn ("That Thing You Do!") and Kim Dickens (Joanie Stubbs in HBO's "Deadwood").

Also cast is local Phyllis Montana LeBlanc, profiled in Spike Lee's documentary "When the Levees Broke" and author of 2008's "Not Just the Levees Broke: My Story During and After Hurricane Katrina" for Atria Books.

In addition to Simon and Overmyer, the show's writing staff includes Tom Piazza (the nonfiction "Why New Orleans Matters," the novel "City of Refuge") and Times-Picayune reporter Lolis Eric Elie (whose documentary "Faubourg Treme: The Untold Story of Black New Orleans" is currently airing on public TV outlets around the country), George Pelecanos (a crime-novelist and "Wire" writer) and David Mills ("Homicide: Life on the Street," "NYPD Blue, "The Wire"). Simon's local consultants include musicians Donald Harrison Jr., Kermit Ruffins (who plays himself in the pilot) and Davis Rogan, as well as chef Susan Spicer.

• When: Shooting on the pilot, or possible premier episode, concluded in New Orleans on April 1. HBO will likely announce the show's pick-up for a full season - or not - in June. If picked up, production on more episodes will begin in November. The series won't air until 2010.

"And let's say, again for the sake of argument, that 'Treme' gets made and that we are able to do what we aspire to do, which is represent the city in a more or less accurate way and capture something of its authentic essence, in ways 'K-Ville' was not able. Would that be because David and I are more familiar with New Orleans than Jonathan and Kevin were, having spent much more time here over many years? That intimacy certainly doesn't hurt, and we've also enlisted as much local expertise as we can bear - people like Kermit Ruffins, Susan Spicer, Lolis Elie and Tom Piazza. But I know Jonathan did his research diligently and had his local resources and worked tirelessly, and both Jonathan and Kevin were dedicated in their efforts to capture something genuine about New Orleans within the requirements of the genre they were working in.

"I think the answer lies primarily not with the creators, but with the larger entities involved, i.e. the studio and network. And this factor is the absolute critical one in the production and creation of any television series. In other words, the difference between 'K-Ville' and 'Treme' (should it ever come to pass, and should it live up to its potential) is less about the differences between Jonathan and Kevin and their colleagues on the one hand, and David and I and our colleagues on the other. Or even the differences between the kinds of shows they are -roughly, cop show versus character study.

"Network versus cable starts to get at the crux, but we have to be more specific: If we're talking about execution and artistic achievement, the crucial difference between what most people thought 'K-Ville' was, and what we hope 'Treme' can and will be, is the difference between Twentieth Television (studio) and Fox (broadcaster) in the one instance, and HBO (studio and broadcaster) in the other.

"As I understand it, the genesis of 'K-Ville' was this: An executive at Twentieth, again with the best of intentions, after visiting New Orleans in the wake of the storm, came to Jonathan, who had a deal with the studio, and asked him to do a show set in New Orleans. (Talk about proving the axiom that no good deed goes unpunished - for both Jonathan and the exec.) Through discussions and consultations with the studio, Jonathan created 'K-Ville,' and he and the studio sold it to Fox (which, although they are corporate cousins, is not anything like a sure thing.)

I have no idea what Jonathan initially pitched Twentieth. I do know, by dint of many years in this business, that Twentieth must have had a lot to say about how it was conceived and what it eventually became, as did Fox, after they agreed to make the pilot, and then, once it was made, to put it on the schedule. I also know, from speaking with people who worked on the show (NOT, by the way, Jonathan or Kevin, with whom I have not spoken) that there was heavy - 'input' is the polite word, 'interference' is the more accurate - from the studio and the network, all the way through the production process, through the very last day of shooting, through the last day of post-production, even after the show cancelled. It's what they do. I was told, for instance, that Jonathan was told to avoid using the word 'Katrina', if at all possible, to not 'dwell' on the storm and its aftermath because it was 'depressing', and couldn't they make New Orleans 'look more like Las Vegas'? Good luck with that note.

"This is standard operating procedure from broadcast networks and television studios. Give lots and lots of invasive, contradictory notes; never do anything that might upset a sponsor or a pressure group; and aim each script at the lowest common denominator, which means never trust the audience to a) wait for, and be comfortable with, any sort of mystery or ambiguity, and b) figure out anything for itself -- which then means explain, explain, explain.

"This sort of pressure from the networks and studios has grown worse in recent years, and it is relentless - and especially with a new show, falls squarely on the showrunner, in this case, Jonathan Lisco. And this sort of 'creative' approach - which isn't creative at all, but springs from two main, intertwined impulses, fear and a need to justify one's job (these entities are unbelievably overstaffed-with-unnecessary-executives bureaucracies) -- manages to violate and cripple the most basic principle and highest pleasure of storytelling, both of which have existed as long as human beings have been human beings swapping lies and whoppers and tall tales around a fire: What the audience most wants to know is, what happens next?

"Ninety-five percent of network/studio notes violate this principle and spoil this pleasure: they want the storytellers (us) to tell the audience ahead of time what's going to happen, and then when it does happen, fearful that the audience is, like turkeys out in the rain, too stupid to close their mouths before they drown, they want what is plainly happening onscreen to be simultaneously explained and underlined for emphasis, in case the audience just doesn't get it, and then, once whatever has happened is over, they want the meaning of that event to be spelled out, post-mortem, in case the audience missed the point.

"No wonder networks have been hemorrhaging audience share for decades, and people are bored by and uninterested in most new network drama shows."